WASHINGTON
(CNN) --
A bronze statue of Helen Keller was unveiled at the U.S. Capitol
on Wednesday as lawmakers praised her as a trailblazer and an
inspiration for those with disabilities.

"Some
are still dismissed and cast aside for nothing more than being
less than perfect," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell,
R-Kentucky, said at the unveiling ceremony. "The story of
Helen Keller inspires us all."

The
statue shows Keller -- who lost her sight and hearing to illness
when she was 19 months old -- standing at a water pump as a
7-year-old, a look of recognition on her face as water streams
into her hand. It depicts the moment in 1887 when teacher Anne
Sullivan spelled "W-A-T-E-R" into one of the child's
hands as she held the other under the pump. It's the moment when
Keller realized meanings were hidden in the manual alphabet shapes
Sullivan had taught her to make with her hands.

"W-A-T-E-R,"
said Alabama Gov. Bob Riley. "Five simple letters that helped
rescue 7-year-old Helen
Keller from
a world of darkness and a world of silence.

"It
is this defining moment that we celebrate today. And in time, this
moment so vividly depicted by this statue helped the world to
understand that all of us, regardless of any disability, have a
mind that can be educated, a hand that can be trained, a life that
will have meaning."

Keller
learned to speak and earned a degree from Radcliffe College and
the women's branch of Harvard University. She traveled the world
as an adult, wrote 12 books and championed causes including
women's suffrage and workers' rights.

Carl
Augusto, president and CEO of the American Foundation for the
Blind, told the crowd he thinks Keller, who worked for the
foundation for the last 44 years of her life, "would have
loved this impressive statue of herself and the symbolism
attached."

Senate
Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, and others assisted Augusto
as he ran his hands over the statue.

The
foundation, Augusto said, still considers Keller "our guiding
light. She embodies the American spirit of limitless possibility
... her biggest desire was to leave the world a better place than
she found it, and ladies and gentlemen, that's the legacy she
leaves all of us."

More
than 40 of Keller's descendants attended the ceremony in the
Capitol Rotunda. Students from the Alabama Institute for the Deaf
and Blind sang a medley of patriotic songs.

The
statue, said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, will
"always remind us that people must be respected for what they
can do rather than judged for what they cannot."

The
statue is also the Capitol's first depicting a child, Riley's
office said.

Since
1864, each state has been allowed to place two statues in the
Capitol. In 2002, Congress changed the law to allow states to
change their statues. Riley, then a U.S. representative, suggested
the state place a statue of Keller, and the state Legislature
passed a resolution asking Congress to accept a statue of Keller
as a gift.

The
600-pound statue is made of bronze with a base of Alabama marble,
Riley's office said.

In
1997, a Franklin Delano Roosevelt memorial that opened near the
National Mall drew complaints from disability advocates because
the statue of the president, who suffered from polio, did not show
him in a wheelchair. In 2001, President Clinton unveiled an
addition to the memorial including a new statue of the four-term
president sitting in a wheelchair.

"By
placing this statue in the Capitol, we appropriately honor this
extraordinary American, and will inspire countless children who
will come to understand that with faith and with courage, there
truly are no limits on what can be accomplished, and there is no
obstacle that can't be overcome," Riley said.

Keller's
statue will replace one depicting Jabez Curry. Curry, who has
represented Alabama in the Capitol since 1908, was a Georgia
native who served as president of Howard College, which later
became Samford University in Birmingham. The Curry statue is being
sent back to Alabama for display at the university.

The
other statue representing Alabama is of Joseph "Fightin' Joe"
Wheeler, a Confederate general during the Civil War who, three
decades later, volunteered to serve in the Spanish-American War at
age 62 and attained the same rank in the U.S. Army, the only one
of 425 Confederate generals to do so, according to a biography of
him posted on the Fort Sam Houston Museum's Web site. His statue
was donated by the state in 1925, Riley's office said. CNN
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